Sunday, October 23, 2016

Just as sunshine, water and nutrients are necessary for
plants to flourish, so too are external factors necessary for human
flourishing. Aristotle was criticized by some other ancient Greek philosophers
for holding that view, but it is hard to see how it could be contentious if human
flourishing is viewed as the
exercise of practical wisdom to pursue goals that each individual values in the circumstances in which they find themselves. The
extent that we flourish - the quality of our lives - is not entirely divorced from the outcomes of our efforts to obtain the goods we value.

As in the preceding post, which focused on the internal
(personal development) aspects of human flourishing, the quotes I have selected
below have been chosen on the basis that they support what I hope is a coherent
set of propositions about external factors affecting individual human
flourishing.

“Natural selection works at multiple levels simultaneously,
sometimes including groups of organisms. I can’t say for sure that human nature
was shaped by group selection – there are scientists whose views I respect on
both sides of the debate. But as a psychologist studying morality, I can say
that multilevel selection would go a long way toward explaining why people are
simultaneously so selfish and so groupish.”
Jonathan Haidt, The Righteous
Mind, 2012,p 218.

2. There
seems to be broad agreement about virtues among almost all religious and
philosophic traditions.

“Led by Katherine Dahlsgaad, we read Aristotle and Plato,
Aquinas and Augustine, … Buddha, La-Tze, … the Koran, Benjamin Franklin … some
two hundred virtue catalogues in all. To our surprise, almost every single one
of the these traditions flung across three thousand years and the entire face
of the earth endorsed six virtues: … wisdom, courage, humanity, justice, temperance,
and transcendence.” Martin Seligman, Authentic
Happiness, 2002, p 132-3.

3. Our social
interactions encourage us to judge our own conduct as impartial spectators.

“Every man is, no doubt, by nature, first and principally
recommended to his own care; and as he is fitter to take care of himself than
any other person, it is fit and right that it should be so. … If he would act
so as that the impartial spectator may enter into the principles of his
conduct, which is what of all things he has the greatest desire to do, he must
… humble the arrogance of his self-love, and bring it down to something that
other men can go along with. … In the race for wealth, and honours, and
preferments, he may run as hard as he can … in order to outstrip his
competitors. But if he should jostle, or throw down any of them, the indulgence
of the spectators is entirely at an end. It is a violation of fair play that
they cannot admit of.” Adam Smith, The
Theory of Moral Sentiments, 1759/1984, II.ii.2.1.

4. Freedom
was made possible by the evolution of abstract rules of conduct which enabled
mutually beneficial transactions among strangers.

“Man has not developed
in freedom. The member of the little band to which he had to stick in order
to survive was anything but free. Freedom
is an artefact of civilization that released man from the trammels of the
small group, the momentary moods of which even the leader had to obey. Freedom
was made possible by the gradual evolution of the discipline of civilization which is at the same time the discipline
of freedom. We owe our freedom to restraints of freedom. ‘For, Locke wrote,
‘who could be free when every other man’s humour might domineer over him?’ …

The great change which produced an order of society … for
the preservation of which he had to submit to learnt rules which were often
contrary to innate instincts, was the transition from the face-to-face society,
or at least of groups consisting of known and recognizable members, to the open
abstract society that was no longer held together by common ends but only by
the same abstract rules.” Friedrich Hayek, Law,
Legislation and Liberty, 1982, VIII, p 163-4.

5. The concept of natural law was important in
opening the way to recognition of the right to liberty.

“The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which
obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will
but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm
another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions … (and) when his own
preservation comes not in competition, ought he, as much as he can, to preserve
the rest of mankind, and may not, unless it be to do justice on an offender,
take away, or impair the life, or what tends to the preservation of the life,
the liberty, health, limb, or goods of another.” John Locke, The Two Treatises of Civil Government, 1689,
II, 6.

6. The
“progress of society toward real wealth and greatness” is hindered by
restrictions on natural liberty.

“All systems either of preference or of restraint … being
thus completely taken away, the obvious and simple system of natural liberty establishes
itself of its own accord. Every man, as long as he does not violate the laws of
justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own interest in his own way, and
to bring forth both his industry and capital into competition with those of any
other man, or order of men.” Adam Smith, Wealth
of Nations, 1776, IV.ix,50,51.

7.The
economic betterment that has vastly improved the lives of an increasing
proportion of the world’s population over the last 300 years can be attributed
to the ‘bourgeois deal’.

“Then after 1798 … life in quite a few places got better.
Slowly, and then quickly, and by now with unstoppable, ramifying worldwide
force, it got much better. Material life got better not merely for Europeans or
imperial powers or Mr Moneybags, but for ordinary people from Brooklyn to
Beijing.

The betterment stands in human history as Great Enrichment,
the most important secular event since we first domesticated squash and
chickens and wheat and horses. …

The real engine was the expanding ideology of liberty and
dignity that inspired the proliferating schemes of betterment by and for the
common people. Liberty and dignity for ordinary projectors yielded the
Bourgeois Deal: ‘You accord to me, a bourgeois projector, the liberty and
dignity to try out my schemes in voluntary trade, and let me keep the profits,
if I get any, in the first act – though I accept, reluctantly, that others will
compete with me in the second act. In exchange, in the third act of a new, positive
sum drama, the bourgeois betterment provided by me (and by those pesky, low
quality, price-spoiling competitors) will make you all rich.’ And it did.” Deirdre McCloskey, Bourgeois Equality, 2016, p 21.

8.. Economic betterment has been associated with
the emergence of emancipative values, and social movements to promote civic
entitlements.

“Most people in … [technologically advanced] societies have
a high living standard, are well educated, and can easily connect to
like-minded others, irrespective of locality. In these situations, and in many
societies approaching these conditions, people recognize the use of universal
freedoms and value them accordingly: emancipative values emerge. Inspired by
emancipative values, people take action on behalf of freedoms. This is evident
in all kinds of social movement activity, the most vigorous of which voice
emancipative goals: people-power movements, equal opportunity movements, civil
rights movements, women’s rights movements, gay rights movements, children’s
rights movements, and so forth. … This is a virtuous circle that describes
thriving societies.” Christian Welzel, Freedom
Rising, 2013, Loc 9324.

9. Classical
liberalism is not an all-embracing ethic.

“As liberals, we take freedom of the individual, or perhaps
the family, as our ultimate goal in judging social arrangements. Freedom as a
value in this sense has to do with the interrelationships among people; it has
no meaning whatsoever to a Robinson Crusoe on an isolated island (without his
Man Friday). … Similarly, in a society freedom has nothing to say about what an
individual does with his freedom; it is not an all-embracing ethic. Indeed, a
major aim of the liberal is to leave the ethical problem for the individual to
wrestle with.” Milton Friedman, Capitalism and Freedom, 1962, p 12.

10. Individual
rights answer the question of how it can be possible for the
flourishing of individual humans to be self-directed without conflicting.

“Individual rights are an ethical concept different from
those concepts generally found in normative ethics. They are not needed in
order to know the nature of human flourishing or virtue, or our obligations to
others, or even the requirements of justice. … Rather, individual rights are
needed to solve a problem that is uniquely social, political and legal. … How
do we allow for the possibility that individuals might flourish in different
ways … without creating inherent moral conflict in … the structure that is
provided by the political/legal order? How do we find a political/legal order
that will in principle not require that the human flourishing of any person or
group be given structural preference over others? How do we protect the
possibility that each may flourish while at the same time provide principles
that regulate the conduct of all?”
Douglas Rasmussen and Douglas Den Uyl, Norms of Liberty, 2005, p 78.

11. The
liberal order can only succeed if sufficient people want to be free to make
their own choices, and are prepared to enter into relationships with others on
the basis of fair dealing, reciprocity and mutual respect.

“I have suggested that the liberal order that embodies
political democracy and a market economy must be grounded in two normative
presuppositions: first, that all persons are capable of making their own
choices and that they prefer to be autonomous and, second, that most if not
all, persons enter into relationships with others on a basis of fair dealing,
reciprocity and mutual respect. I have also suggested that, from certain
perspectives, observed reality in politics and economics may not seem to square
with those presuppositions. My argument is that, nonetheless, and regardless of
what may be observed, we must, within limits of course, proceed as if the
presuppositions are satisfied. …

Properly designed institutional-constitutional safeguards
against deviations from the norms can be effective … only in settings where the
share of participants who might behave in violation of the norms of autonomy
and reciprocity remain relatively small. Generalized or widespread failure of
persons to adhere to these norms, along with widespread recognition that others
also disregard the standards, will ensure that the liberal order itself must
fail, quite independently from any institutional safeguards.” James Buchanan, Why I, Too Am Not a Conservative, 2005, pp
26, 28.

Sunday, October 16, 2016

The quotes selected for this post are related specifically
to individual flourishing or personal development. I will follow this up later
with a selection of quotes relating to the social conditions that favour human
flourishing.

Rather than selecting the most inspirational quotes I can
think of I have selected quotes that seem to support what I hope is a coherent
set of propositions about human flourishing.

1. Happiness is the final end to which humans
are naturally attracted.

“Since there is evidently more than one
end, and we choose some of these (e.g. wealth, flutes …) for the sake of
something else, clearly not all ends are final ends; but the
chief good is evidently something final. ...

Now such a thing happiness [living well and doing well], above all else, is
held to be; for this we choose always for itself and never for the sake of
something else …” Aristotle,Nicomachean Ethics, Book 1, 7.

2. Reflection tells us that there is more to
happiness than having a successful life.

“For both ancients and moderns, the starting point for
considering happiness is a conventionally successful life which the agent finds
satisfactory. … We have no concept which readily covers both the unreflective
notion of success in life from which we start, and the revised notion of
success in life with which we end if and when we have appropriately revised our
priorities, and given morality its appropriate place in our life. The fact that
we lack such a concept doubtless owes something to our tendency to see the
pursuit of morality as being always likely to be in tension or conflict with
the pursuit of other ends.” Julia Annas, philosopher, The Morality of Happiness, 1993, p 453-4.

3. Human
flourishing is the exercise of practical reason to actualize human
potentialities.

“Ontologically considered, human flourishing is an activity, an actuality, and an end that is
realized (or a function that is performed) through the self-directed exercise
of an individual’s rational capacity. … As an actuality, human flourishing
consists of activities that both produce and express in a human being an
actualization of potentialities that are specific to the kind of living thing a
human being is and that are unique to each human being as an individual.”
Douglas Den Uyl and Douglas Rasmussen, philosophers, The Perfectionist Turn, 2016, p 45.

4. We feel elevated when we contemplate the natural
beauty of our world and the kindness of other humans..

Many words have been written to express such thoughts, but the
those that come to mind at the moment are the lyrics of “What a Wonderful
World”, a song written by Bob Thiele (as "George Douglas")
and George David Weiss, first recorded by Louis Armstrong, and
released in 1967. You can view the lyrics and listen here.

5. We are responsible
for setting the internal rules that determine our behaviour.

“The brain is an evolved system, a decision-making device
that interacts with its environment in a way that allows it to learn rules to
govern how it responds. It is a rule-based device that works, fortunately,
automatically.” Michael Gazzaniga, neurologist, The Ethical Brain, 2005, loc 1278.

6. Individuals
flourish as their reason and emotions learn to work in harmony.

“We sometimes fall into the view that we are fighting with
our unconscious, our id, or our animal self. But really we are the whole thing.
We are the rider, and we are the elephant. Both have their strengths and
special skills” p 22.

“Reason and emotion must work together to create intelligent
behaviour, but emotion (a major part of the elephant) does most of the work” p
13.

“The easiest way to convince yourself that you don’t have
mobility is to form ironclad concepts of yourself and how you do things … . Freedom is about realizing that you always
have the choice to start moving in any desired direction regardless of your
past.” Timothy Gallwey, coach, The Inner
Game of Work, 2000, p 126.

9. You get to
choose whether to be content with past achievement or to stoke motivation.

“Once you have taken the first two steps in self-control –
setting a goal and monitoring your behaviour – you’re confronted with a
perennial question: Should you focus on how far you’ve come or how much remains
to be done? There is no simple, universal answer, but it does make a difference
… . For contentment, apparently, it pays to look how far you’ve come. To stoke
motivation and ambition, focus instead on the road ahead.” Roy Baumeister and
John Tierney, psychologists, Willpower:
Rediscovering our Greatest Strength, 2011, Loc 1804

10. Be yourself!

“The paradox that frees you from all the prisons of self and
the worries about image and approval is that the highest development of self is self-forgetfulness. When you
fully integrate the awareness that it’s not about you, your focus shifts. Now
you realize it’s about the experience, the contribution, the exploration, the
discovery, and transformation. Now you’re free to be fully present without
double-tracking in your head worrying about whether you have their approval.”
Michael Hall, psychologist, Unleashed, 2007.

Sunday, October 9, 2016

This question is prompted by my reading of Innovation and Its Enemies, Why people
resist new technologies,a recently published book by Calestous Juma. The
author takes much of his inspiration from Joseph Schumpeter, who famously
described the innovation process as one of creative destruction. Juma argues
that new controversial technologies are likely to enjoy more local support “where
the business models include provisions for inclusive innovation”. I will
explain later.

As the title suggests, the book explores resistance to
introduction of new technologies. It does this mainly by telling the stories of
nine innovations: coffee, printing of the Koran, margarine, farm mechanization,
AC electricity, mechanical refrigeration, recorded sound, transgenic crops, and
AquaAdvantage salmon.

Anyone who has an interest in innovation is likely to enjoy
reading the stories presented in this book. Without reading a book like this
one it would be difficult to fully appreciate that goods, like coffee, that are
now commonplace, were once highly controversial innovations. The stories told
in the book make me wonder whether future generations will look back with
bemusement about my concerns about artificial intelligence and neural lace.

Although Calestous Juma delves into history in these case
studies, he does not seek to provide much historical perspective on changing
societal attitudes toward innovation. I doubt whether he believes that we are
living in a time when opposition to innovation is particularly great by
historical standards, but his views on such matters are not obvious from this
book. Readers need to look elsewhere (e.g. The Enlightened Economy,by Joel Mokyr) for an understanding of the industrial
enlightenment that began to occur in western Europe around 300 years ago. The
author’s neglect of this big picture of attitudinal change is surprising in view
of his acknowledgement that he obtained “early inspiration” from an article by
Joel Mokyr on innovation and its enemies.

The stories told in Juma’s book are enlightening about the
nature of resistance to new technologies. The general message is that
resistance should not be lightly dismissed as irrational fear of change:

“Many of these debates over new technology are framed in the
context of risks to moral values, human health, and environmental safety. But
behind these genuine concerns often lie deeper, but unacknowledged,
socioeconomic considerations. This book demonstrates the extent to which those
factors shape and influence technological controversies, with specific emphasis
on the role of social institutions”.

One of the things the book demonstrates is that resistance
to innovation is often fuelled by people who have reason to fear competition
from new products and new ways of doing things. Those faced with potential for
economic loss have used every trick available in an attempt to protect
themselves from the consequences of innovation. It is certainly true that many
members of the public have genuine concerns about the potential impact of
innovations on public morals, health and the environment, but the losers from
change often exploit such concerns mercilessly to persuade governments to
protect their interests. Thankfully, since the industrial enlightenment, the
efforts of the losers to protect themselves from new competition have not been particularly
successful.

Although he has chosen a similar title for his book, the
author is clearly not a fan of Virginia Postrel’s The Future and its Enemies (which I discussed here).
He has little faith in the capacity of the spontaneous processes of free
markets to manage innovation:

“Managing the interactions between change and continuity
remains one of the most critical functions of government”.

Again:

“Political leadership on innovation and the existence of
requisite institutions of science and technology advice are an essential aspect
of economic governance. Such institutions need to embody democratic practices
such as transparency and citizen participation that accommodate diverse sources
of expertise”.

The author’s apparent faith in government regulation of the
innovation process sits oddly with his acknowledgement of shortcomings in
existing regulatory processes which focus largely on the risks of introducing new
products. He acknowledges that these processes often fail “to compare the risks
and benefits associated with the new product to those of existing production
systems, even though it is precisely this difference that should form the basis
of a regulatory decision on new technologies”. The author also acknowledges the
potential for consumer protection regulation to be used for protectionist
purposes:

“What may appear as a legitimate appeal for the right to
know may in fact be driven by an effort to brand a product so it can be
rejected by consumers for protectionist reasons”.

I agree with the author that sensible political leadership
is a fundamental requirement, but sensible political leaders will aim to
confine regulatory interventions to those circumstances where there are good
reasons to fear that spontaneous processes might lead to outcomes that will be
widely regretted. When political leaders set out to manage interactions between
change and continuity they open their doors even further to interest groups
seeking preferential treatment. It would be nice to think that sensible
policies and social harmony will emerge from citizen participation that
accommodates diverse sources of expertise, but experience suggests that elected
politicians are more representative of broader community interests than are the
interest group spokespersons that governments select as citizen representatives.
The most likely outcome is for the interests that would be represented in such
forums (e.g. consumer, environmental, industry and union groups) to conspire to
protect their interests in regulating markets, at the expense of the interests
of the broader community in allowing free competition to determine outcomes
under most circumstances. The critical requirement for sensible policy
development is for the claims of interest groups to be subjected to critical
scrutiny within the context of a public inquiry process that is capable of
providing trustworthy independent advice to governments. (Australia’s
Productivity Commission may provide a useful model for other countries to
consider.)

Calestous Juma suggests several ways in which innovation could
be made a more inclusive process: greater involvement of public sector
institutions in providing training in the emerging fields; creation of joint
ventures; equitable management of intellectual property rights; segmentation of
markets to enable the technology to be used for non-competitive products, and
improvement of the policy environment to support long-term technology
partnerships.

Smoke and mirrors may help political magicians to appear to
be ‘inclusive’, but they cannot alter the fact that some people are adversely
affected by innovations that provide widespread benefits to the broader
community. In her book, BourgeoisEquality, discussed on this blog a
couple of months ago, Deirdre McCloskey uses the term, ‘bourgeois deal’ to refer
to societal acceptance of innovations that compete with and displace old ways
of doing things in exchange for widespread improvements in living standards. I
doubt whether ‘inclusive’ innovation policies - even if designed by intelligent
and well-meaning people - can do much to help sustain public support for the
bourgeois deal. Ongoing support for the bourgeois deal depends on expectations
that innovation will continue to generate widespread improvements in living
standards.

Postscript:Calestous Juma has responded as follows:

"I appreciate your thoughtful review of my book. You raise
important points that need addressing. First, you wondered why I did not
address the question of whether public attitudes on new technologies have
changed over the centuries. I address this issue by showing that the public
responses to new technologies appear to be conserved over the 600 years that
the case studies cover. At face value this may appear not to be the case
because of the remarkable proliferation of technology into every aspect of human
life. I think that the change has been in the availability of technologies due
to the exponential growth in science, technology and engineering. Public
perception of technological risks has not changed, mostly because as humans we
have not changed in any discernible way over the last 600 years. We have not
found a way to reprogram the amygdala, to simplify a little.

Now to your more complex question: is inclusive innovation
compatible with creative destruction? My answer is yes. In many cases
disruptions, to use the term in a more prosaic way, is largely a result of the
business model used. There are two examples that illustrate this. The
introduction of mobile phones in Africa was by any measure disruptive. But it
was also inclusive because from the outset the focus was to ensure that the
poor had access to the service. Inclusive innovation was achieved through
low-cost handsets and pre-payments for airtime. The early concern that mobile
phones would be toys for the rich never came to be. The second example involves
the strategies adopted under the Montreal Protocol to develop alternatives to
the ozone-depleting substances. In this case those firms such as DuPont that
were likely to be disrupted by alternative chemicals were included in new
research efforts. The Protocol went further and introduced an amendment that
promoting the sharing of the new technologies with developing countries.

Both examples involved private-public partnerships that were
committed to promoting inclusive in innovation. In both cases incumbent
technologies were displaced. Both case provide lessons of inclusive innovation.
We can trace other examples of inclusive innovation in history. We have café au
laite, as the name advertises, because of compromise to create a recombinant
product. Proposals for co-existence are not new. It was tried, without success,
to leave a niche for horses in American agriculture in light of the relentless
march of tractors. The proposal came too late and the superiority of tractors
over horsepower illustrates that there are many areas of technological
transformation where inclusive innovation is not a viable option. In other
cases there has been a long period of co-existence between butter and
margarine. This wasn't a result of an inclusive innovation strategy but it
offers some lessons worth considering."

Emancipation

Welcome!

Welcome to Freedom and Flourishing. While you are here, why not take a look around and leave some comments.

There is a list of my most popular posts below. I am pleased that a post about characteristics of a good society, that I wrote in 2009, is still one of the most popular. That post captures some of the ideas about freedom and individual human flourishing that I think are most important.